Try your hand at transcribing a 1775 letter

[TalesOfTheSevenSeas]

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Here is a copy of my gr-gr-gr-gr-great Grandmother's letter, which describes to George Washington what my gr-gr-gr-gr-great Grandfater was doing up in Nova Scotia. There are some words, represented by parenthesis below that I can't quite figure out. The writing becomes very "stressed" as she tells what happened to her husband. Her daughter had died only two days before she wrote this. Any of you who would like to take a stab at filling in the blanks for me, I'd greatly appreciate your help! Here is my transcription and below is the scanned image of the actual letter.

Transcription of Sarah Fulton’s Letter to George Washington:

To his Honor: Major General Washington Commander in Chief of the Continental Army in America.

Honored Sir,

We your humble petitioners beg leave to lay our pitiful circumstances before you and entreat your favors. We would hope from your Elevated Station and goodness that something may be done in our favor. In the month of August in the present year, Misters Robert Fulton, Robert Clarke, Joseph Berry (or Barny?) Thomas ( ) and our husbands, with John Patten, William Patten and David ( ), young men, went in a Sloop east and as far as St. Mary's Bay, in the Province of Nova-Scotia, to get (Food?) (&) (Hay?) for themselves & were unfortunately ( ) upon by two Sloops of War, Cap. (Dawson?), Cap. Graves ( ) ( ) ( ) of ( ) & ( ) send ( ) to (Dawson?). We have, some of us, large families of children & are unable to help ourselves or them. Our Friends & Neighbors, (tho' never do a thing?), can afford us but little (charity?) by reason of the great scarcity of Provisions occasioned by the Drought, the severity of the Land, & trade having stopped- We entreat you, honor'd Sir, to give our petitions a gracious hearing: & if you please, upon the Redemption of Captives to favor the above aforemention’d Persons it will cause our Hearts to sing with Joy.

Sarah Fulton. Jannet Berry (or Barny).

( )( ). Hannah Harvard

( ) on October 12. 1775

from Sarah Fulton et al

Sarah Fulton & others

[MadMaryFlint]

Wow, that's great, Quill! What a piece of history!

[Captain Sage]

You're like a museum all by yerself! Where in the world do you get this stuff? Are you a research librarian, too? I'm fascinated.

Captin Sage

[Deacon Frye]

Claire, I did some poking about and came up with a few links. I'm sure you're aware of this already, but Sarah seems to have been a remarkable woman, and I get the impression she wore the pants in the family:

http://www.medford.org/History/book/fulton.htm

http://www.szumski.org/gendb/d0000/g0000045.html

http://www.moondance.org/2001/summer01/col...mns/column3.htm

http://netsquirrel.com/hunt/contest/junvol...l01/v01n05a.htm

http://userpages.aug.com/captbarb/spies.html

http://www.nps.gov/fopo/exhibits/women/women2.htm

There were many more.

It's possible the third husband in your letter, David, may be a member of the Goudy (Goudie, other spelling variants) family that Capt. Weaver mentions on the Prison Ships thread.

[TalesOfTheSevenSeas]

No, I'm not a research librarian, I teach computer aided drafting and I manage the drafting and general education departments for a vocational college. But I've always been a history junkie and have been researching the revolutionaries in my family for about 15 years. These letters were a recent discovery when the George Washington collection was put on-line. The Library of Congress scanned 65,000 pieces of personal papers and put them all in a searchable database.

If anyone's interested, here is the story. Sarah and John Fulton knew Washington. He visited them at home to honor Sarah for her contributions to the revolution. John was one of the Sons of Liberty. Sarah's brother Nathaniel's home at Hollis and Tremont Streets is where the Boston Tea party was planned, and John, Nathaniel and Sarah's brothers David and Josian were among those known to have dumped tea in the harbor. Sarah and Nathaniel's wife dressed them in their costumes and had to hide them from British soldiers who came looking for the rabble-rousers later.

Sarah is also credited with having aided wounded soldiers at Bunker Hill and she did a bit of battlefield surgery, removing a bullet from a soldier's cheek.

Her biggest claim to fame took place when John was asked to deliver dispatches to George Washington. John was sick, so Sarah volunteered to go in his place. She delivered the dispatches under cover of darkness and "borrowing" a boat to cross the Mystic River. She arrived home safely after her mission and stood on her doorstone to watch the sunrise that morning. That doorstone is now her grave marker.

Sarah is also know for an episode in which John was bringing in a load of wood for the American troops. He was stopped by British soldiers who took that wood. When he came home empty-handed, Sarah ran out the door after the cart. She caught up to it, and turned the oxen around by the horns. The British soldiers threatened to shoot her and she shouted back "Shoot away!" at them. Apparently, in that day and age, they were so blown away by that, that they just sat there on the cart and Sarah hauled them in, where they were taken into custody. So she's also credited with their capture.

We only recently found out that after his release from imprisonment in Nova Scotia, that in 1780, John went back and did a spy mission in preparation for an attack on Fort Halifax. I have those letters and transcriptions also. If you guys enjoy puzzling over Sarah's I'll post John's also. We never knew about the 1775 and 1780 involvements in Nova Scotia until I found the letters. The only reference I found in 15 years was a single line that read that John Fulton had been imprisoned with his relative, Robert Fulton. That was it. Then I found the letter above and a whole forgotten story came to light.

I'm up for any ideas you have on Canadian / Nova Scotia / Halifax / British Naval archives / St. Mary's Bay history info.

I'd also like to hear what your thoughts are.... I think Sarah's letter says the men were in Nova Scotia getting food and hay, but just how likely is it that a boatload of active revolutionaries were all the way up in Nova Scotia where a whole lot of privateering was going on, simply to get food and hay?

Or do you think the letter says something else? I just can't make it out, even after seeing the original a few months back in Washington DC. (I also got to see Sarah's wedding dress at the DAR Museum)

[Animal]

Claire, Could you email me a copy of this and I'll see if I can enrich it to be able make it more readable.

Animal

[Deacon Frye]

On 25 November 1776, Sampson’s luck ran out. The Independence met with the British sloop-of-war Hope, commanded by George Dawson, a Lieutenant in the Royal Navy. Battle ensued. Sampson and his ship were captured, some of the crew were killed. Sampson’s conduct was so valiant that, when he did surrender his sword to Dawson, Dawson returned it to him in recognition of his courage.  ...

Sampson was sent to Nova Scotia and placed on board a prison ship, the Boulongua, anchored in Halifax Harbor in the Bay of Fundy. He wrote a letter to the Massachusetts Provincial Congress describing conditions on board the ship

We are all in number on board 100 and in general in a deplorable situation, having been robbed of most of our clothing by the different ships we were taken in. One of my men was froze to death the 13th instant & there is about 40 more froze, some badly, 4 sent to the hospital, one of which so badly froze tis thought he will lose both his legs. The ship we are on board of is old, open & leaky, it is the inclemency of the season, are short of provisions and necessaries of life. Shan’t think strange if many of us should not survive until the opening of spring, except some method can be taken to exchange prisoners. (NDAR) ...

Sailing Off to Serve

[TalesOfTheSevenSeas]

Deacon Frye,

Dawson is mentioned in Sarah's letter!!!!! Looks like you may be onto something here!! Your source is listed as NDAR, I'm guessing you meant NSDAR (National Society of the Daughters of the American Revolution) But could you please point me to what document this quote comes from please? This is awesome... THANK-YOU!!!

Animal,

The copy above is the best and clearest scan available. You'll have to try to enhance that, if possible, I'm afraid. The original is in the George Washtington Papers Collection in the Library of Congress. I visited it and the ones written by John Fulton also. (I'll post those next) the letters are not even allowed to be touched by human hands to maintain their preservation. I'm afraid we'll have to work with what we've got. I posted the largest scan. Thanks and good luck working with that!!

[TalesOfTheSevenSeas]

More on Deacon Frye's info....

Found the source document at Pilgrim Hall and will look more into that. Thanks! It's a year after my ancestor, but may very well be the same Dawson who appears to have captured my grandfather.

[Deacon Frye]

I have a good feeling about Lieutenant Dawson, Claire. After all, how many Dawsons could they have had commanding sloops of war in these waters?

There's a more in-depth account of the battle with the Independence here:

http://kingstonobserver.com/history-septem...mber-2002.shtml

I'm afraid I haven't done so well with Commander Graves so far.

The thing about the drought has me a bit stymied. If there was in fact a drought it should be verifiable. And if there was a drought, the story could be accepted at face value--it would have been worth the risk to obtain food and fodder. They would have no trouble trading in Nova Scotia--several settlements were of folks who had migrated from the lower colonies and were sympathetic to the American cause.

The thing is, I have no recollection of a drought in Massachussetts at this time, and a cursory search turns up nothing. By contrast, drought and its effect on the western Massachussets farmers is often cited as a major contributing factor to Shay's Rebellion of 1785-6. Of course, this doesn't mean there wasn't a drought, just that I can't find it.

I think its most likely that there was a drought, but there was so much going on at the time that perhaps it went unnoticed in most historical accounts.

On the other hand, if further research were to turn up no drought, one might suspect that this is a code of sorts, as it wouldn't make a very convincing cover story.

It strikes me that the stated crew of the sloop is rather small for privateering. On the other hand it is larger than the normal crew of a merchant vessel that size. It's possible they may have been doing some espionage work or perhaps intended to drum up support for the rebellion in Nova Scotia. Wild guesses, perhaps, but see this chapter from The History of Nova Scotia:

The Awakening

Interestingly enough, our HMS Hope, trailing her prize and in the company of some other vessels makes an appearance in a footnote to this chapter:

FN32 Ch12 HMS Vulture had been sent up earlier; HMS Hope and the HMS Diligent arrived on December 2nd; and the HMS Lizard on the 15th. Two other vessels came in company with the war ships on the 2nd: the Nancy and the Independence. The Nancy, apparently the "large victualing ship from Halifax" to which Goreham refereed in his journal; the Independence a captured American privateer with 14 guns and one hundred men, the guns of which were removed and mounted at Fort Cumberland. (See, Joseph Goreham's journal, op. cit.; and see Clarke, op. cit., at p. 207.)

A couple of thoughts on the text of your letter:

Where you have "went in a sloop east", I believe it reads: "went in a sloop eastward". This may seem nitpicky, but I believe the folks in that area and time used "the eastward" to refer to the Gulf of Maine, much as we say Down East to refer to the Maine coast.

Also, where you have "Cap. Graves ( ) ( ) ( ) of ( ) & ( ) send ( ) to (Dawson?)", the word in the original looks like "Boston" to me rather than "Dawson". I can't make out the words in between either, or why some are crossed out.

[TalesOfTheSevenSeas]

Wow, thanks for taking such an interest Deacon! I agree with you, in looking back at the style of Sarah's "B" in "Bay" agree, the letter appears to say "Boston" rather than the second incidence of "Dawson".

I do have some info about the conditions in MA at that time. (gotta get it from my other computer.... see next post....)

[TalesOfTheSevenSeas]

!!! Re-examining....!!!

I think it says "...& sent word to Boston" which would make total sense that news would come through there as her family was all there.

Good call on Boston Deacon!! Maybe we can decipher the rest as well! Thanks!!

Here is the quote from the book “Medford in the Revolution."

“...Owing to insufficient food and housing the summer of 1775 was very sickly, and was especially fatal to the little ones. Out of fifty-six deaths recorded, twenty-three were children.” (Mary, Sarah's daughter, died in October)

[Deacon Frye]

Hmm ...

Boston itself was still in British hands under Howe at this point.

One thing that occurs to me is that the Royal Navy has kept all ship's logs going back well before this period (except for the ones that went to the bottom or were captured).

It might be worth tracking down, though entries tend to be laconic ("captured rebel sloop").

[Jamaica Rose]

A book that might be of help and of interest to you in your transcribing projects is:

"Reading Early American Handwriting" by Kip Sperry

I got my copy at Colonial Williamsburg, it's soft cover, 8 1/2 x 11" size 290 pp, and the price on the back is $29.99

Publisher is:

Genealogical Publishing Co., Inc

1001 N. Calvert St., Baltimore, MD 21202

Good luck transcribing,

--Jamaica Rose

(who just noticed that there are blood smears on the outside edges of the pages of my copy of the book -- wonder how they got there? At least I "think" it's blood. Could possibly be taco sauce.)

[TalesOfTheSevenSeas]

Thanks Jamaica, I'll get that book!

Deacon, hmmmmm.... I wouldn't think that Boston being under British control would have affected word arriving in Boston of John's capture, as he seems to have been imprisoned for some aggression, or perhaps, some act that was viewed as hostile if he was indeed just getting food and hay with a sloop full of rebels Wouldn't a family still receive word of a capture? Particularly when a boat load of buddies from the same town perhaps didn't show up as expected? The capture took place in August and the letter was written in October. My guess is that they guys never showed up wherever they were headed, inquiries were made and sure enough... the guys were discovered to be imprisoned at Halifax. This is total conjecture, but what do you think?

[Deacon Frye]

What I'm thinking, Claire, is that John and his neighbors may have been sent to Boston, and not Halifax.

In August '75, Howe and the British were still firmly ensconced in Boston. Boston was the base of their operations in this theater. They wouldn't evacuate to Halifax until the following year.

If you look at the two words following "Cap't. Graves", the second appears to me to be "landmen" or "landsmen". The first, while badly disfigured, may well be "being". "Being land(s)men" here would of course refer to John and the other farmers form Medford.

A possible scenario:

The men of Medford, being in desperate need of food for their families and fodder to keep their livestock alive, charter a sloop in one of the coastal towns to take them eastward to NS. The reason for the significant number coming along is to harvest the hay and crops which would still be standing in the fields in August. They are taken by Commanders Dawson and Graves, who on determining that they are rebels take the sloop as a prize. Always in need of trained seamen they impress them into His Majesty's service. Not being desperate enough to go to the trouble of training landsmen, however, they send the farmers to be held in Boston.

[TalesOfTheSevenSeas]

I agree with you ... It does look like it says "Landsmen" and could quite likely say "sent them to Boston" rather than "Sent word to Boston" which is good, as they would not have had to endure the British Prison ships or the prison in Halifax. (Boy this is really exciting!! I just love this stuff!!!) I'll see where prisoners would have been kept in Boston, and we'll go from there! The only thing that makes me wonder otherwise, is that in 1780, John was sent back to Nova Scotia to do a spy mission on Halifax Harbor and the Fort. He must have spent some time there and have been familiar... Hmmmmmmmmm....*scratches head*

I agree, and I think you're probably on the right track though. These guys were not experienced sailors by the sounds of it and from what I know, and it was probably pretty apparent when they were captured, that they were not privateering. I'm guessing this capture was a piece of cake for the Brits!

One correction, our rabble-rousers were not farmers. They lived in town. John's official profession, when he wasn't raising hell with the British, was as an accountant and he loaned money to pay soldier's wages during the revolution. Their house on what was then called Main St. in Medford, but is now named to honor Sarah as Fulton St., was a residential dwelling just down from Craddock's bridge and not farmland. Having given up their money and a lack of farmland could account for these families additional hardships, if food was already in short supply.

I'm not certain of the other's mentioned in the letter. All the ones that I could make out- Robt. Fulton and the Pattens, were known rebels and they are all three mentioned in various places throughout the book Medford in the Revolution. Robert was apparently a cousin, but that is all I know of him.

Again Deacon, thank you for you help and interest in this! It really helps to have another set of eyes to look at the words and pick out what I couldn't read- like landsmen and Boston. This has been tremendously helpful. I think you'll really enjoy the next letters, which I'll put up soon. John Fulton's spy mission in 1780.

[Deacon Frye]

I'll eagerly await the next installment.

[Cap'n Coyote]

Claire,

I don't know how far you've gotten with this letter, but this is what I have come up with:

To his Honor: Major General Washington

Commander in Chief of the Continental

Army in America.

Honored Sir,

We your humble petitioners

beg leave to lay our pitiful circumstances before

you & entreat your favors. We would hope from

your Elevated Station & goodness that something

may be done in our favor. In the month of

August in the present year, Messiers Robert Fulton,

Robert Clarke, Joseph Berry, Thomas Harvard our

husbands, with John Patten, William Patten and David ( ),

young men, went in a Sloop eastward as far as St. Mary's

Bay, in the Province of Nova-Scotia, to get to a (?)

(Hay?) for themselves & were unfortunately taken by two

Sloops of War, Cap (?), Cap (?) being cannon-

ades of France & were then sent to Boston. We have,

some of us, large families of children & are unable

to help ourselves or them. Our Friends & Neighbors, tho' ever so willing, can afford us but little (?) by reason

of the great scarcity of Provisions occasioned by the Drought,

the sterility of the Land, & trade being stopped- We would

humbly entreat you, honor'd Sir, to give our petitions a

gracious hearing: & if you please, upon the Redemption of

Captives to favor the above mention’d Persons it will

cause our Hearts to sing for Joy.

Sarah Fulton. Jannet Berry.

( ) Clarke. Hannah Harvard

( ) on October 12. 1775

from Sarah Fulton et al

Sarah Fulton & others

A couple of notes: Cap was the old French for Cape. Could she have been naming the sloops instead of referencing the Captains?

I'm pretty sure that 'Charity' is not the word used in reference to the Friends & Neighbors. There is an older English word that translates to pretty much the same thing, and it's on the tip of my brain, but hang me if I can remember it.

Hope this gets you further along. And Happy Birthday.

[TalesOfTheSevenSeas]

Thanks for your input Cap'n Coyote and for the birthday wishes. Interesting info, although I don't know if the French part would apply to this letter- My ancestor was American of British origin so I don't think she would have used Cap for Cape, but that's a total guess on my part. Also, were there French ships in Nova Scotia in 1775 making captures of Americans and then going to Boston? I don't know and perhaps you can fill me in? I'm kind of inclined to think the word looks like "landsmen" and the context that Deacon Frye suggested seems to work, but I'd love to hear what you think, I'm not an expert, so I'm very interested in other people's ideas about the transcription. I'll try to get the other letters from John Fulton up in the next few days.

[Cap'n Coyote]

Thanks for your input Cap'n Coyote and for the birthday wishes. Interesting info, although I don't know if the French part would apply to this letter- My ancestor was American of British origin so I don't think she would have used Cap for Cape, but that's a total guess on my part. Also, were there French ships in Nova Scotia in 1775 making captures of Americans and then going to Boston? I don't know and perhaps you can fill me in? I'm kind of inclined to think the word looks like "landsmen" and the context that Deacon Frye suggested seems to work, but I'd love to hear what you think, I'm not an expert, so I'm very interested in other people's ideas about the transcription. I'll try to get the other letters from John Fulton up in the next few days.

I actually started to include a disclaimer about historical context, but decided not to. It only occurred to me after looking at a map of Acadia-Nova Scotia from the late 18th C. It was there that I noticed Cap Se Marie, among others, and I just followed a logic chain. I know little of the history of that time period, I just knew that the French and English were then fighting for control of that land.

Do you agree that Sarah seems to use the word Messiers? That struck me as kind of odd. I also could not find any record of ships known specifically as 'cannonades,' but I was allowing for the possibility of a slang term referencing their firepower.

I had not read any of the posts between yourself and Deacon Frye before I tackled it. I was pleased that I had reached some of the same conclusions ya'll did (oops...slipped into my native North Carolina tongue for a minute). It was a fascinating letter, and I thank you for sharing it, both for the firsthand account and the cryptographic exercise.

Looking forward to the others.

CC

[Mission]

Out digging in the archives of Twill again and I found this, which I thought would be interesting to those of you considering a letter-writing campaign. It's a little out of period, but not too far...

[LadyBrower]

Very neat! Thank you for finding this. =)

[Mission]

Very neat! Thank you for finding this. =)

There's actually lots of cool stuff in the archives. It's all there for the asking. (I saw the PC vs not discussion at least three times yesterday.)